Revolution: Should You Be Excited?

For those of you that don’t know, Revolution is an upcoming post-apocalyptic drama due to arrive this fall on September 17th. At SDCC this last weekend, the pilot was shown to the public for the first time and was greeted with mixed response. Could it be the next Lost? As long as it doesn’t go the way of Firefly and be awesome only to get cancelled (sob). From the first few trailers and the pilot, there is definitely some promise, but whether it can live up to that is another question entirely. Let’s have a look over what it does and doesn’t have going for it.

The Good:

It’s Pedigree – Have you seen the team that’s backing this? It has J. J. Abrams as an executive producer, the guy responsible for Lost, the Star Trek reboot and Super 8. That alone is exciting, but when he’s teamed up with Eric Kripke, creator of the Supernatural series things start to get impressive. But wait! A wild Jon Favreau has appeared! Director of the Iron Man movies and stepping in to direct the pilot for the show. With these minds behind it, surely the show is set for success?

It’s Concept – I’m a big sucker for post apocalyptic fiction and this show has a cool premise, with plenty of mileage to capitalize on. Whether it can differentiate itself from the likes of similar shows like Jericho is yet to be seen but I find this kind of fiction fascinating and I’m always eager for more.

It’s Action – From the extended trailer, you see clips of what looks to be a pretty intense sword fight, more flamboyant for sure than it’s Game of Thrones counterpart (Though it’s lightsaber adaptation could give it a run for it’s money here spoilers). The action seems particularly impressive and we don’t see enough cool sword waving on our TV screens so this can only be a good thing.

The Bad:

It’s Simplicity – There are three ways this could go down, it could be mind baffling and an overcomplicated mess, it could be two simple and not deliver on the mystery to drive people to want to watch it or it could get the balance just right. Of course I’m hoping for the latter but Lost grew too big for itself, following the first path and main actor Billy Burke’s quotes “I don’t think people will be confused in the slightest watching it.” and “We cut back and forth a little bit in time, but it’s all pretty linear and very easy to follow and highly entertaining.” suggest there might be little substance for the fans to delve into and dissect.

It’s Drama – I’m not gunna lie, from the trailers I’m concerned about the acting and whether the drama of the piece is going to fall a little flat. If it’s got this great action and compelling mystery but you don’t particularly care about the characters it’s not going to hit home. They need to focus on the personal aspect, that’s something Kirkman nailed with The Walking Dead, the best thing about post apocalyptic fiction is seeing how it affects the people. I don’t want this to fade away as a bad knock off of Hunger Games or something.

It’s Realism – From the car lights going out to form an aesthetically pleasing sweep to the oddly accelerated reclaiming of our cities by good old nature. How the hell did all those tree’s grow over the buildings in just 15 years? How is there a plane landed in a random field when we clearly see a plane crashing out of the sky as a result of the power disappearing? With a lot of these series that aim for great sweeping stories, oftentimes the details are forgotten and it’s things like this that detract from the world and it’s realism. I hope they pay attention to the little stuff as well else this could feel contrived and silly.

Well there we go, there are definite good points and a few things to be concerned about but overall I’m excited to see how it turns out. The mixed response to it’s pilot isn’t the sound of a death knell, many shows have grown and grown from a slightly weak pilot, though of course many others have sunk into the dark only to have their lights snuffed out once and for all (forgive me). Are you excited? Should you be? Let us know in the comment section below!